Raw Desert Quartz Block
Raw Desert Quartz is a type of block that can be found in small pyramidal "spires" that jut out of the Sand in Desert and Beach biomes. These Desert Quartz spires generate fairly often, and span from the topmost level of Sand, all the way down to the Sandstone beneath it, making Desert Quartz a rather abundant resource. It is tannish-peach in color, similar to the brown variety of quartz that exists in real life. Raw Desert Quartz Blocks require a Stone Pickaxe or better in order to mine them, but due to the fact that they generate in Sand, the player can generally get a Sandstone Pickaxe easily if they want to harvest a Desert Quartz deposit. It drops 1 to 4 Desert Quartz items when mined, but can be obtained via a Silk Touch enchanted Pickaxe, or by smelting Smooth Desert Quartz or any of its variants. Once returned to it's raw form, it can be crafted into Rough Desert Quartz Tile. Crafting Smelting Natural Occurrence Raw Desert Quartz, unlike most of the mod's other ores, generate in structured "spire" structures, rather than randomized underground veins. The spires tend to be rather pyramidal in structure, and generate with a base of 5 Raw Desert Quartz Blocks that form a +, and 1 to 3 more blocks which form a small pillar above the base. While the stucture appears small at a distance, its base extends deep into the Sand, stopping only when it hits Sandstone or Stone, which causes the average spire to contain over 25 Raw Desert Quartz Blocks total. The spires themselves generate relatively sparatically, and appear scattered across Deserts and, occasionally, Beaches. Known Bugs None. Trivia *Desert Quartz was added to the mod very close to when it was first created, during Minecraft's 1.4 release. As a result, the Nether Quartz that was added to Vanilla in update 1.5 had not been announced yet, and the block was simply named "Quartzite". When 1.5 was released, the block was changed to drop items rather than itself, so as to be consistant with Vanilla's Quartz, Chiseled and Pillar variants were added, and its name was changed to "Desert Quartz" in order to avoid confusion with the other variety that was native to the Nether. *When they were first added, Desert Quartz and Granite both generated in large veins underground and had almost exactly the same properties, aside from their textures. However, upon the release of 1.5, Desert Quartz was changed to generate in the Sand of Desert biomes and was given many more aesthetic uses, while Granite remained underground and became a building and tool material. *Desert Quartz spires were originally intended to be large, 5 to 10 block tall cones that would contain much more Desert Quartz, but generate much more rarely. Due to issues with getting the large spires to be shaped correctly, they were instead replaced with the current, simpler variant, but the larger variety will eventually retuen once we can figure out how to code them properly. *At the moment, Desert Quartz serves no purpose aside from aesthetics. However, it will eventually be used for a variety of light-related applications, and will play a greater role in many of the machines planned for the mod's tech segment, Extrapolated Technologies. *Contrary to its name, Desert Quartz can technically generate in any biome. However, due to it's requirement of Sand, it typically only generates in Desert or Beach biomes, with the extremely rare case of a spire generating in the tiny bit of sand next to a surface-level Water lake. *Some Priest Villagers will buy Desert Quartz, meaning that the player can make a decent amount of Emeralds if they happen to find a Desert Village with a Priest who is buying it. History